To Cait, With Love
by B. Lleyn
Summary: The Lincolnshire gentry all know Caitlin Snow to be the oddest girl about, because of her interest in medicine. Some know her as Killer Frost, shady overlord of the resurrection trade, and fewer know of her help in the Canary's business of helping people disappear. But to him she was Cait, and this their story. Regency AU, takes place in same universe as The Dark Prodigal.
1. His Return

_London, 1814_

Were she not alone in the chaise that transported her to Grovesnor Square, any companion who shared that confined space would have observed at once how tense she was.

Her shoulders were drawn back. Her back was a straight rod. Her hands here clasped tightly together in her lap.

It took a while for the butler to announce her arrival at Starling House, but that tenseness did not leave her body even when she laid eyes on an old friend in the person of the Duchess of Starling.

"He arrived this morning," said Felicity, approaching her not without some difficulty owing to the large swell of her belly. The duchess was with child and due to give birth soon, something which also showed in the awkward amble of her gait and the hand she had propped behind her back to support the weight of the babe she carried. She took her tense hands into her own. "I'm so sorry, Caitlin. I truly am."

"I want to see him."

It had been that way ever since she received the news of his return to England. She had been allowing some other person who responded to her name to take her through the preparations required for a journey from Lincolnshire to London, to give directions for the care of her patients should she fail to return in time, and then to make the journey itself.

It was this other Caitlin Snow that responded to the duchess now, who asked to see the duke's cousin who had been discharged from his service in the navy on account of his injuries, and then sent straight to his cousin's house in London when there was no where else in the city for him to go to. If she kept thinking of him as merely the duke's cousin, then this Caitin could continue to operate as though he were some other patient that she was invited to examine.

Felicity opened her mouth, and then closed it, and looked away. "I will take you to him."

Perhaps it was a good thing that the duchess's pregnancy prevented her from rushing, for it gave Caitlin time to further compose herself. She had not acquired her icy reputation for naught, and while her longstanding friendship with Felicity prevented the duchess from truly believing in Caitlin's mask of reserve, at least she would not alarm the patient with her own feelings.

It was imperative as a doctor that she put the patient first.

She waited for the duchess's footman to knock on the door to a guest room, and the duke's forbidding face appeared in the crack. His gaze softened as he laid eyes on his beloved wife, and it hurt her to see how they communicated a wealth of information merely in the way they looked at each other.

On most days the fourteenth Duke of Starling could match her in the frostiness of his dismeanour, but he was most solicitous as he allowed her to enter the dark room where her patient lay, covered by blankets.

"Leave me alone as I asked, Ollie," she heard him say in a rough voice, so different from the softer one she had become accustomed to recalling as she pressed her lips to his letters, and she had to strengthen her resolve as she brought herself next to the bed so she could see him better.

The lower half of his face was covered in a five o'clock shadow, a look that was more commonly sported by his ducal cousin, but the blue eyes that widened upon catching sight of her person were unmistakably his.

"Ronnie," Caitlin said, her voice cracking and tears welling up in her eyes.

Her fiance turned his face away from her and addressed his cousin, his tone accusatory. "I said I wouldn't see her, Ollie. Send her out of my room at once."

Tears were streaming down her cheek as the duchess came to usher her out, but Caitlin could see how he closed his eyes as if the sight of her repulsed him, as if the woman he had once professed to loved and cherish was now anathema to him.

"He didn't mean it, Caitlin," said the duchess softly, rubbing her shoulder.

"Much as I hate to say it, Miss Snow, I was the same when I first returned to England and Ronnie will come around," said the duke, who had never been to war but whose famous story of abduction and possibly torture aboard a prison hulk in 1807 was still talked about amongst the _ton_ , and that barely scratched the surface of his five years away. "He just needs time."

They respected her desire to be alone, and she was shown to another guest room, some considerable distance away from the one occupied by Ronnie. Her things had been left there for her, and she sat on the bed for a long spell of silence before rushing to her valise and tearing it open with her nerveless fingers.

The objects of her desire lay on top of her clothes, and she could no longer maintain the shell of cool that she had been wearing all day when she saw it. Clutching the first of his letters to her to her chest, she sobbed and shuddered from the bitter pain that coursed through her entire person.

The letter she held had been unfolded and folded away again and again throughout the years, and the words that were pressed to her breast were familiar from the numerous times she had read them, sometimes out loud, sometimes silently, but always with the sweet feeling of knowing she had his love.

They were her only coherent thought as she wept, the words that he had first sent her when he had gone to serve as a physician for the Royal Navy:

 _7th October 1809_

 _Dearest Cait,_

 _I have been assigned to the HMS Firestorm, which is by far the worst name that anyone could possibly christen a ship. I feel almost ashamed of it as I write you, save for the knowledge that you have such a peculiar sense of humour that I am obliged to tell you everything that happens to me in the off-chance you find it funny. Are you laughing now, my darling?_

 _I find myself cringing even though I have written the above words and will not cross them out. We never were the sort to exchange endearments, and though I have resolved to be as loving as possible in my letters to you, I find myself almost chafing at the self-imposed requirement of giving you love-words. Instead I make note of your oddities and remind you of their fixation in my memory of you, though never fear, I have yet to mention my close acquaintance with the oddest woman in Lincolnshire to any of my shipmates in this first week, mostly because I've not yet judged them worthy of the privilege of knowing you, seeing how I scarcely know them as of yet. The only one worthy of mention at this stage is the captain, a Harrison Wells, who is the most enigmatic fellow you can possibly imagine. He retreats into his personal cabin in every spare minute he has, and will not socialise with the rest of the crew. I think he may match you in being standoffish, Cait, and I look forward to cracking that façade as I did with you._

 _Give my love to my father and my stepmother, and do take care during your house calls not to overexert yourself._

 _Yours, etc._

 _PS: Your oddities and tendency to prickiness are two of the things I love most about you._

* * *

 **To readers that have followed me from The Dark Prodigal, I am so sorry, I know you all are waiting for me to update you with regard to Felicity's status but at least you now know she marries Oliver by 1814. Typical of my wanderlust, I find myself tiring of London as a setting after painstakingly taking Oliver and Digg back from Bristol and I really wanted to write a story set in the countryside (they'll be heading to Lincolnshire soon). I also wanted to write a more romantic story, which is why I dropped the side story about how Barry met Felicity (set in Cambridgeshire) and wrote this instead. I tried to be neutral when I wrote The Orion Inquest but it should be very clear now that I'm a SnowStorm shipper as opposed to SnowBarry. I also kinda wanted to write the scene which led to the line about Ronnie swimming nude in the lake near Caitlin's house, which is a throwaway remark in The Orion Inquest (the side story I was writing about Barry happens to be the result of the throwaway remark in The Dark Prodigal Felicity makes about their meeting).  
**

 **To any new readers, it's very nice to meet you, and you should know now that I have the habit of writing notes at the end of the chapter to explain any historical details. This chapter is very sparse on such since it just sets things up, but I should mention that Ronnie fought in the Napoleonic Wars, and research for Chapter Two has led me to read about Joseph Manton and James Miranda Barry, who were actual people in the 19th century. I can't wait to get there - though I do need to write Chapter 28 of The Dark Prodigal first.**


	2. Their First Meeting

_Lincolnshire, 1808_

Her father had a new student, one that he was quite proud to have.

This Caitlin was sure of, from the underlying current of excitement that followed each member of the household about as they went about their day. He was due to arrive at dinner time, she surmised, when a friend of hers called at the house around noon time to deliver something for her father.

"I can see why Dr Snow would be excited," murmured her friend Cisco distractedly, as he checked the specifications on the gun her father had ordered before formally handing it over.

Despite being a foreigner to these parts, Francisco Ramon had swiftly ingratiated himself with the local gentry with his pleasant demeanour and innovative gun designs – he was hailed as the next Joseph Manton – which were obviously offered to fellow inhabitants of Lincolnshire at a much lower rate than what they would cost in London. It was collectively agreed amongst the old families in the region that while they would never dream of marrying one of their daughters to a Catholic man of uncertain descent like Mr Ramon, there was little harm done in including him for dinners and balls, particularly when the confirmation of his appearance would secure the attendance of a good many eligible young gentlemen, all anxious to know when Mr Ramon would be able to finish their new guns for them.

Caitlin drummed her fingers on the table next to them. "And why would that be?"

"Really, Caitlin, whatever can be a finer opportunity for a man with an unmarriageable daughter than to have an unmarried gentleman come to stay for a couple of months?"

She did not swat him for his words, but only because he was still holding a gun. "Tell me, Mr Ramon, why are we friends?"

"Because you're the model of taciturn surliness, while I am everything that is friendly and affable. I saw fit to spread my God-given bounty with the less fortunate," he said, setting the gun down. "All done. Your father will be pleased with this one."

"And Mr Raymond?"

"I heard in the village that he was top of his class at Edinburgh, and is related to a duke. A most marvellous personage to come to our little part of Lincolnshire, to be sure," said Cisco. "You should probably just ask your grandmother. She always knows everything that happens."

Cisco got on famously with Caitlin's grandmother, and was right about the woman's capacity for gossip, but Caitlin was not about to encourage the matchmaker in her.

"No, thank you, Cisco. Will you be averse to some tea before you leave?"

"I'd love to, but I must be going – I need to get started on the next order," he said, getting to his feet. "Will I see you at the assembly on Saturday?"

Caitlin tilted her head in hesitation. "I'm not too sure … You know I'm not too fond of dancing…"

That was a falsehood, of course. She loved dancing, in the rare occasions that a gentleman asked her to be his partner, despite the fact that she was Dr Snow's exceedingly odd spinster daughter – she was only one and twenty but all agreed that it would take a very indulgent gentleman to put up with her bluestocking tendencies, distinguished as her family was in these parts.

"But you are fond of music, and so it is settled that you will come to prevent poor Mr Ramon from offending with his foreign ways," Cisco said. "At the very least we'll be wallflowers together."

"You're a man, Cisco. You can't be a wallflower."

"You're inviting a bad pun in response, Caitlin. You're going to regret this." His dark eyes darted with his thoughts, but the entrance of her father put an end to the topic immediately.

"Mr Ramon," said her father, putting his black bag down slowly.

"Dr Snow! I just delivered your new gun – do let me know if you have any questions," said Cisco.

More pleasantries were exchanged before Cisco excused himself, and Caitlin regarded her father in silence. Echoes of their fight from the previous night came to mind, but she asked if he cared for luncheon instead, and sat by his side as he ate quickly, so that he could continue paying house calls with little interruption to his packed schedule.

"Mr Raymond will be joining us for dinner, Caitlin. The new student highly recommended by Dr Martin Stein, if you remember the man. Do speak to cook about the arrangements, and given that your grandmother has been feeling poorly today, I do believe you will have to be hostess."

She had served as her father's hostess on numerous occasions before, and indeed was expecting to do so this evening, but his mention of it was exceedingly curious. Caitlin expressed her consent and then asked about the calls he had made.

"They're doing well."

"And does Mr Mardon's leg still run the risk of putrefaction following your discovery of putrefaction the last time you called?"

Her father set his fork down. "Caitlin, have you been reading my notes again?"

There was no denying the source of her knowledge. "Yes."

"Kindly desist. I will not budge on my decision, Caitlin, and nothing you do will persuade me to bring you on house calls, or indeed, to sponsor any form of instruction in medicine."

She sat straighter in her seat, even though her posture had been perfect from the start. "Father, I don't understand your reluctance for me to know something of what is it you do. I'm not expecting Cambridge or Oxford to take me as a student – I just want to learn."

"No. I have been indulgent, by allowing you to read some of my books, but no daughter of mine will soil her hands with what is the rightful profession for a gentleman. Particularly when you are well aware that I do not accept just anyone as my assistant – only the finest fellows from their respective schools, and even then at high recommendation from my colleagues in this profession of ours."

"Then teach me, father," she pleaded. "You know I can do it – I memorise texts faster than the last student you had, and I am far from squeamish whenever an emergency case is brought up to the house. You've seen nurses, midwives and – and herbal healers, all of whom are women, and I can't see what is it so different about what I'm asking of you!"

"You're already the talk of the village for your mention of anatomy in a drawing room, much less your peculiar habit of bringing home dead animals and taking them apart in your bedroom – thank God I put a stop to that by your sixteenth year, when I found out about it.

"It is not proper for a woman of fine breeding to mention the body, let alone bodily functions. I cannot know what it is that I was thinking, to allow you to sit in on my conversations with the students that come to stay, especially given that it has bred ideas in your head – ideas that you may do anything apart from attracting a gentleman to marry, as is your duty!" He paused to drink from his cup. "We will not talk more about this, Caitlin. My resolution is final, and you're just upsetting me in between house calls at this point."

Caitlin stewed in resentful silence as her father called for more ale, her mouth set in a hard line. It was scarcely her fault for being born female, denied of the birthright that was her father's practice, which had been passed on from son to son to son until the present Dr Snow, who only had her as a daughter. She knew that it was his ambition to hand it over to a bright physician willing to take on their name, and yet she had always wanted to be Dr Snow herself.

Medicine had always fascinated her, from a young age. She loved the intricacies of bodies, the way everything was connected to the other, and yet packed all so beautifully together. There was elegance in bone structures, and she understood strength and frailty all the better having examined musculature. Caitlin did not always understand or agree with human behaviour, but she longed to study the human body, more than anything she could possibly want, even the possibility of ever finding a husband who would support her dream.

"There, there, my dear Cait," said her father, interrupting her thoughts as he patted her hand rather awkwardly. Dr Snow had married late and never quite knew how to connect to his daughter, particularly after his wife perished of consumption when Caitlin was still young. "If it is medicine that interests you so badly, then you should contrive to marry a medical sort as opposed to just about any gentleman. Why don't you wear your most fetching frock this evening? I'm told that Mr Raymond is a most eligible bachelor."

She wore the frumpiest, most non-descript gown she could find in her closet. There was the truly horrendous confection of lace and satin that an aunt had left her, but she discarded that option fairly early on as she decided on her dress for dinner, for donning that particular gown was akin to alerting her father of her intentions, not to mention unnecessary torture on her.

It was universally agreed that Dr Snow's odd daughter would not attract any suitors for her being so odd, but they had yet to level the charge at her that she was blind to fashion and taste altogether.

Her maid had offered to set her hair into a more elaborate arrangement for the occasion, but she had declined, not without a bit of perverse pleasure at the perfidy she was about to enact. If her father thought her better for nothing than marrying one of his precious students, then she would go to all lengths to evade that fate by turning off the most precious of his students thus far. In fact, she was quite ready to despise Mr Raymond, for he possessed everything she could ever hope to want, and whatever unfairness there was in her singling him out for her hatred would surely be made up for by the ire that he would have for her by the end of his visit. She hoped he was an unpleasant and pompous sort, easy for her to bait when she was not being the most curmudgeonly virago she could possibly be without being uncivil.

The flaw in her plan, however, became immediately clear when the man appeared in her dining room. Mr Ronald Ryamond was as well-mannered as he was handsome, and he had kind words and a winning smile for everyone, even the servants. That her father quite doted on the man upon meeting him was exceedingly clear, but she fancied she saw the footmen trying to change the person whom they were to serve dinner to at each course, just so they could preen with pride as Mr Raymond thanked them.

Mr Raymond and her father carried most of the conversation at dinner, for while her father always maintained his preference for country life, he was keen to hear of the comings and goings in the Royal College in Edinburgh, which Mr Raymond duly supplied, complete with witty observations that rather served to rankle Caitlin.

He made it exceedingly difficult for her to remember that she had to loathe him, especially how he turned to flash her a warm smile and then solicited her opinion at the end of every account he provided. It was not even as if she could hide, given the small number in their company, and the fact that he was seated right next to her during dinner.

She could not conceive of a more nightmarish situation.

"What are your interests, Miss Snow?" said Mr Raymond, as dinner came to an end and her father became embroiled in a discussion with the butler about the possibility of sending a footman down to ensure the nearby lake was sufficiently stocked so that his guest and him could fish on the weekend.

"Hacking off the limbs on a corpse," she replied, intending to shock the man, though it was not too far from the truth – she was never happiest than when she was surrounded by blood and guts and trying to figure out what ailed a creature to cause its death.

Mr Raymond laughed good naturedly at that. "Good heavens, Miss Snow. You are quite the physician's daughter, aren't you?" She could tell from the twinkle in his eye that he thought her merely jesting.

Having finished his bout of mirth, Mr Raymond leaned closer to her, and then said, "Tell me, Miss Snow, do you always look so beautiful as you do now when you are dealing with an appendage?"

Caitlin's cheeks flushed, and she gasped with anger. She understood precisely what ribald reference he was trying to make, and that he had thought to inflict such upon her at her dining table was cause for rage.

"Why, Mr Raymond," she began, but her father interrupted her sentence by asking his guest if he would like to join him for a smoke. The impertinent scoundrel replied that he did, and Caitlin was left to wring her hands in irritation in her room.

Sometimes her father's students believed themselves worthy of succeeding the famous Dr Snow, and so sought to secure their fate by wooing his daughter at the same time. Men of this sort were quickly dispatched with when they realised how cold her reception was to their attentions, and that she was more knowledgeable than them about their field when the learning pertained to books, but never had anyone made such an improper advance immediately upon making her acquaintance, much less insult her intelligence by describing her as beautiful when she was wearing that particular dress!

Caitlin narrowed her eyes. She felt a deep antipathy for Mr Ronald Raymond, there was no mistake of it.

* * *

Ronnie felt like the veriest fool. He had known he had misspoken, the moment Miss Snow's expression froze and she took a sharp breath in response to his words. The words themselves were a stupid idea, even though he had meant them entirely.

She was the loveliest woman he had ever laid eyes on, and he lost any of the confidence he typically carried about to speak to women when he walked into her dining room.

Perhaps there were women that were more beautiful to be found in England; his rake of a cousin Ollie would surely laugh at him were he to speak of the stirring in his heart whenever he but looked at Miss Caitlin Snow. It was just the way she held herself, like a island of seclusion that no man might disturb, lest its forbidding beauty threaten to overwhelm his senses altogether.

 _Hell._ The woman made him a poet.

In any case he had been simultaneously dismayed and delighted to be seated next to her at dinner, desperately trying to remain outwardly confident and charming to catch her attention as she had caught his, but she remained impervious to any of his overtures, and was unflappable and laconic despite all his efforts to engage her in conversation.

And so Ronnie turned to her, and deliberately phrased his words in a way that would push her to react.

React she did. He watched with fascination and a bit of glee as she seemed to catch a spark, and defrost before him. Her eyes widened. Her nostrils flared ever so slightly. And Ronnie found himself even more in danger of being hopelessly attracted to his new mentor's daughter, in spite of the fact that he just baited her.

When he had won the recommendation of his tutor for the opportunity to study under the famed physician, he did experience some regret at having to miss out on the fun of joining his cousin and Lord Thomas Merlyn in London. But then he had not expected to encounter the allure of such a singular woman during his two months under Dr Snow's tutelage in Lincolnshire. The prospect of engaging in his study of medicine was always a part of his anticipation for this use of his holiday, but he found he was very much looking forward to living under the same roof as Miss Caitlin Snow.

* * *

 **A/N: I completed 3000 words of TDP so I allow myself to post this, which was actually how I intended to begin the story. All readers are warned that there will be two timelines in this story, which may not progress at the same pace. What happens in 1814 will go a lot slower than the skips I have to make to cover 1808 to 7 October 1814, for instance. 7 October was chosen in the last chapter because that was the date of The Flash's debut, which is me not being subtle.**

 **Joseph Manton was the finest gunsmith of the flintlock age and we know that Cisco is a genius when it comes to gadgets so it was fun to draw that comparison. I might work an anachronistic reference to the percussion cap to demonstrate this genius of his, either in this fic or The Dark Prodigal, but to be honest I can't see how gun design will come up as of now in this story.**

 **I break a rule in my fanfic writing with this chapter, the rule being not to introduce Original Characters. But I didn't quite know how to write this without alluding to Caitlin's father, and so I had to write him in, though interactions will be kept to the minimum. I tried to look for 18th century medical notes when I wrote this but because this is the fic that I write when taking a break from the heavy stuff in my other fic, I didn't try to belabour the text with lots of historical detail. Mr Mardon is the Weather Wizard, of course. Ronnie's left with the final year of his training in Edinburgh in 1808, which will allow him to qualify for the needs of the Royal Navy by 1809. We'll probably go back to the heavy content of 1814 in the next chapter, so I really hope you enjoy the levity in this meet-cute.**


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